


Starry, Starry Night

by alltheglitters



Series: Thick as Thieves [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Art School, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Alternate Universe - Heist, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Artist Steve Rogers, Awesome Peggy Carter, Bumbling idiot Steve, F/M, First Meetings, Fluff, Heist, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-14
Updated: 2014-10-14
Packaged: 2018-02-21 01:04:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2449604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alltheglitters/pseuds/alltheglitters
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is immediately after Steve Rogers, a newly minted art thief, finishes his first mission in which he and his team recovered a Klimt masterpiece that he meets the elusive and brilliant Peggy Carter on the streets of New York.</p><p>Maybe, just maybe, a beat-up jacket, the perils of high heels and a shared interest in art may mark the beginning of their romance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Starry, Starry Night

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in my art heist alternative universe. Based in New York City, Steve, Sam, Bucky and Natasha hunt down art thieves and return stolen paintings to the public.  
>    
> This scene is a preview to the overall story, and can be read as its own standalone one-shot. This takes place after their first mission in which they recovered a Romanoff family heirloom.
> 
> Disclaimer: in its use of intellectual property and characters belonging to Marvel, this work of fiction is intended to be transformative commentary on the original. No profit is being made from this work.
> 
> Unbetaed. All mistakes are my own.

"I believe in love at first sight, but am not burdened with the misconception that it's a first sight at all." - Tyler Knott Gregson.

 

 

 

 

Steve Rogers was _thinking_ , and when he was thinking, he was always in his own head. The adrenaline, the high... he had never felt anything close to this before. Maybe, if everyone knew of the thrills of committing art theft with their best friends in order to return stolen paintings to the public, there wouldn't be a need for drugs. Just added security.

He was thinking about Natasha and whether she was alright. He was worried, and for good reason. It was not everyday that, after months of work, your friends, Steve, Bucky and Sam, asked you to give up a family heirloom because the masterpiece _wasn't yours_ , and that you actually had no legal right to it to begin with. He still didn’t know the woman well enough. Not after four months. She wasn’t someone who you could get close to easily, but she was someone he respected – and Steve’s respect needed to be earned. So, the fact that she had it at all...

Regardless, the Gustav Klimt portrait was back in the museum where it belonged. And their adventure was over, for now. Until the next time... if there would be a next time.

“Oh!”

It wasn’t until he heard the startled voice that he realized that he had run directly into someone. A woman. Her back was to him, and she wore a red, silky dress, which flowed through the air as the wind blew.

“For god’s sake,” she snapped. “My grandmother had more coordination than that, god rest her soul – I’m in the middle of the _street_!” When she spun around, her eyes were fierce.

She was half-hopping. It was just then that he saw that her heel was stuck in a crack in the sidewalk, and that she was pivoting in order to speak to him. Well, yell at him, more like.

“I’m sorry! Let me help you.” Though his natural instinct was to steady her, he also had to resist the urge to just stand still and stare at her. She was the most stunning creature he had laid eyes on.

She had textured brown hair that she tied in a bun with wisps of soft curls floating around the nape of her neck. Scarlett lips matched the dress, which was sleeveless and formal, and made of a silky material that his fingers were dying to touch. The neckline had a slight dip in the centre. Framed by strong, arched brows, her eyes were dark, though under the moonlight he couldn’t tell their exact color. Her cheeks were pink.

Her features were beautiful. Patrician and strong. Classical and modern, at the same time.

The artist in him couldn’t get enough.

It also helped that the dress had a slit along the side and revealed a fair bit of leg.

Her expression softened, anger dissipating, as she took in his demeanor and the hands in his pockets. Bucky often said that, despite being six-foot-tall and built, Steve was about as dangerous as a puppy, though at the moment Steve was eager to not look like a puppy. He couldn't exactly brood, but he wanted to appear tough, _masculine_ … if he could pull that off.

Masculine puppies… did those exist?  _Boy_ puppies?

Just when she was about to continue twisting her heel, he bent down and slowly slid the shoe from under the crack. The leather at the back was scuffled, so was the red sole, but altogether it was salvageable. Taking in the tension in the way she carried herself, he asked whether she had a… “Bad night?”

“It certainly was.” She didn’t say anything more. A girl like her, in that dress, was probably running away from a high society ball.

And a boy like him, a blue-collar kid from Brooklyn turned _thief_ (albeit a high-end one), was probably miles out of her league. In another realm, even. Nevertheless, he mustered his confidence and introduced himself. “I’m Steve. Steve Rogers.” When he extended his hand, she took it. He could just feel how sweaty his calloused palm was getting.

“Peggy Carter,” she answered easily, slipping her heels off and into her hands. It didn’t hit him until now that her accent was foreign. She was from the other side of the pond. “Nice to meet you, Steve.”

“Which way are you heading?”

“I’m going that way.” She pointed over her shoulder in the general direction he had come from.

“Ah me too,” he found himself saying. He could simply drop her off at her house, then head to his studio afterwards. “Well, I’ll… I’ll walk you back. It’s the least I can do… after _that_ – ” She looked confused, forcing him to realize that he hadn’t actually done anything wrong. It wasn't as though he tripped her. “For a beautiful dame - ”

She raised an eyebrow at the draconian term. “A dame?” She didn’t seem to pick up on the fact that he said that she was beautiful, or if she did she wasn’t fazed.

Then again, Steve was certain that he wasn’t someone who had an effect on anyone.

“Er, a woman. A beautiful woman,” he corrected himself. Gradually, he could feel his cheeks burning.

She smiled at him, her big eyes lighting up. As they reached a spot next to a lamppost, he could tell that her eyes were a warm chocolate brown. He could melt into them.

Having stared at her for the most of the last three minutes (which made for some awkward sideways walking on his part), it only occurred to him suddenly that she was merely wearing a cover-up shawl thing. She wasn’t actually shivering, but her dress was so thin that he was concerned. Autumn in New York could be quite chilly. “Do you… do you want my jacket?”

“I reckon that _you_ might be cold.”

“No, I’m fine, ma’am. I stay warm easily.”

She was in a gown, for god's sake, while he was offering her his old, beat-up jacket. Thus, it was a surprise when she accepted it graciously.

Seemingly smiling to herself, Peggy looked grateful as he draped it across her shoulders.

“My friends from home, they say that chivalry is dead.”

“Just doing my part, ma’am. Mom had brought me up to be nice to, er – ” Oh god, it had been a while since he had talked to women. The last time he had properly spoken to a person of the opposite sex was… well, never. Natasha didn’t quite count. To him, she was one of the boys. “Where’s home for you?”

"Home?"

“I mean, I er, I know… you’re British… _English_ – ”

“Actually, home is that way.” She lifted her chin in the direction of the brownstones in front of them, wit in her eyes. He liked that she was teasing him slightly. “What do you do, Steve Rogers?”

He grinned. He didn’t know that his name, as plain as his Irish roots, could sound this good and exotic on someone’s lips. He knew that he sounded crazy, he _felt_ crazy; the Brits couldn’t have been _that_ foreign! Exhaling, his head was exploding. “I’m a student. That, er, means that I study. Don’t have a job yet – I do visual arts, some art history, at the school, the New School. I’m also teaching there as part of um, the, at the school.” He didn’t feel the need to tell her about his scholarship. He felt like he would be _bragging_ , and he wanted to make an impression on her without having to do that.

Not that he had much to brag about.

“So you _teach_ at the school and you study at the school? Sounds like a job to me.” She laughed, and he wondered if she was laughing _at him_ (after all, he had a history of embarrassing himself in front of women), but the tenderness in the way she spoke informed her that it wasn’t like that.

He hardly had enough experience with the opposite sex, but he would hazard a guess anyway: if he was correct in interpreting her expressions and general body language, he would deduce that she was actually enjoying herself.

“It’s interesting that you study art.”

“Yeah?”

She continued to walk ahead, her fingers brushing Steve’s. Her touch sent a tingly feeling through his body; he could almost feel it in his veins. It _couldn't_ have been a mistake. It just couldn't. She was doing it to gauge a reaction from him.

“Yes, I’m involved in an art conservation group in New York. That’s actually why I’m here. The principal objects conservator is wonderful, and she asked me to visit for the next few weeks to – oh, gods, it’s a long story. Lorraine Smith is – ”

“You know her?” Lorraine Smith, despite being not much older than him, was well-known for her work on private collections and in various objects conservation departments at fine arts museums, but you had to be in this kind of circle to be familiar with her work.

“Of course. Lovely woman, and dear friend. Do you know her?”

“Well, she doesn't know me... but she was a guest lecturer at school last year.” Pause. “Um, are you talking about the group in Brooklyn?”

“Yes, that’s the one.”

Ms Peggy Carter indeed must have been somebody important, not just a girl running from a ball, because this art foundation in Brooklyn was one of the most exclusive and effective one of its kind. Only the best acted as consultants.

In the next fifteen minutes, he walked her back to her place, the guest-room in a friend’s house. On the way, they had talked about paintings they loved, sculptures (strangely enough, she said that they never interested her: “You can do more on canvas.”), her trip to New York, and how she loved that, thanks to the history, many of her favorite museums in London were next door to one another. Having been spending time 24/7 with the same three people, Steve thought that it was interesting to hear _new_ opinions. That the boys and he had received a similar education meant that, no matter how open-minded they pretended to be, they often approached something in the same way. Natasha thought differently most of the time, but she didn't often vocalize how she actually felt anyway.

As for Peggy, many of her unorthodox views on art he would never actually accede to, but she had argued her case well.

Forget the angles of her face, and that he thought he could fill up several pages of his leather sketchpad with just drawings of her. Her words reminded him of why he loved art so much as to dedicate his life to drawing. Even if he was certain that he would be unemployed and dirt-poor for a while (or a longer while), he loved art for all it was worth – ambiguous, multifaceted and historical. And incredibly, incredibly captivating.

By the time they reached her doorstep, she stood along the stairs just outside. When she was a few steps above him, she was looking at him at eye-level.

She simply said, “Do you want to come up, Steve?”, and it shocked him how direct she was being. He wasn't used to women paying him much attention, because ninety-nine percent of the time he felt like a bumbling idiot. Not that today was an exception for him, but... _she_ was an exception.

“I – I shouldn’t.” His head was already spinning, not from the alcohol, but from her presence. “Peggy… I really, really shouldn’t – I’m not sure that I can…”

In the same matter-of-fact tone, she asked, “You want to, don’t you?”

Of course he did, but it was getting late, and he didn’t want his housemates to worry if he were to stay with Peggy. Oh for god’s sake, that wasn’t a reason. Based on the last conversation he had with them at the pub before he started to head back, Steve figured that Sam and Steve were likely to be so wasted that they wouldn’t be thinking about him in the next few hours – or they wouldn’t be at home at all. They were celebrating their first mission after all. “I do, Peggy… but um…” He gaped at her for a bit.

It dawned on him that there wasn’t any valid reason or excuse he had.

He was just _scared_. Despite his clammy hands (which he prayed that she didn’t notice), he had been doing pretty well with her so far. And he knew that his luck wouldn’t last. It never did.

Hell, he was certain that this was the first conversation he had with a woman that lasted for more than ten minutes that was not facilitated by or _regarding_ James Buchanan Barnes.

He felt his face redden again and he knew that he would be blushing furiously. She must have picked up on his nervousness as he saw that she was chuckling. Was it that obvious that he was anxious? “We can talk. I’ll show you some of the paintings that I'm working on with Lorraine... Most of them aren't actually _here_ , but I'll show you the photographs, at least.”

Her lips were pursed as he agreed to come inside. When he closed the door behind him, he finally noticed the dark palette of the sky. The starry night.

He had always been partial to starry nights in the city (they reminded him of his childhood when Mom and he would watch the occasional meteor shower in Central Park), so it was funny that he didn't realize until now -

Peggy... Peggy. He was busy taking in all of her.

 

 

 

 

 

He said his goodbye at seven-thirty am in the morning after an entire night of just talking to her, bathing her in, and gazing at her (and trying to not outright _ogle_ ). She had a great eye for detail when it came to restorations, and he loved hearing her talk. She was particularly animated when discussing how to mimic an artist's brushwork, her hand gesturing in the air as though she was imagining the paintbrush between her fingers.

When he finally got in, Steve told himself to wipe that smile off his face in case one of his housemates was in the studio and having an early breakfast.

But it was hard to not grin like an idiot when he could still feel her lips along the corner of his mouth.

 

 

 

 

 

FIN.

**Author's Note:**

> In addition to being heavily involved in art conservation, Peggy also has a few secrets up her sleeve (which will be revealed in due time!).


End file.
